


Young Love

by 29PheonixLement



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:55:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25774741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/29PheonixLement/pseuds/29PheonixLement
Summary: AU-ish idea of how Regina was introduced to Alice.
Relationships: Alice | Tilly/Robin | Margot, Evil Queen | Regina Mills & Wicked Witch of the West | Zelena
Comments: 7
Kudos: 64





	1. Chapter 1

It was a few weeks after her niece had come back into their lives. Regina finding she could breathe a little easier now than she had been worrying over just where Robin might have ended up after the last curse had been cast.

She found that she could even smile a little at how well Margot seemed to be settling in after her time wondering the world. Remembering how trapped Robin had confessed to feeling after growing up in Storybrooke then and even from her time having adventures in the new Enchanted Forest Regina could honestly say she was happy her niece had finally gotten to experience the world for once without her or Zelena’s sheltering influence.

She just hated that all of those memories had to come from a curse meaning that on some level they had happened to someone else and not Robin herself.

Now she could understand why Jefferson had gone even madder than normal before the first curse had been lifted. Having two lives in her head was getting to be a strain even for a strong-willed mind like Regina’s.

Heck Robin hasn’t even been back a full month yet and Regina was still catching herself wanting to use her real name instead of the one the curse had given her.

Ten times now in the last few days alone. Not that she’d been counting or anything.

Thankfully, she didn’t need to have that problem with Henry.

She reaches out blindly searching for the half-empty glass of whiskey she’d allowed herself when she’d started her task as her eyes scan another row of numbers letting both the familiarity of her (or at least Roni’s) nightly routine of going over the night's receipts for the bar and the soft burn of the alcohol distract from the pained tug in her chest.

She’d thought lying to Henry was hard but having to keep up the act around Robin was even more of a struggle. Luckily, she hadn’t caught both in the same room yet, but she felt her luck slipping away on that ticket.

Her glass ran dry on her next sip making her groan in frustration as she mini slams it back onto the table having already given up on trying to distract herself with ‘work’.

“Regina? Darling. What’s wrong?”

The former Evil Queen doesn’t look up from her moping glare of the tabletop at her sister’s question. Nor did she make any move to even suggest she’d hard it in the first place.

“Hey.”

A soft hand brushes her arm as Zelena pulls up a seat beside her. “Talk to me, sis.” The eldest of the Mills sisters probes somehow managing to unscrew the top off of one of the cucumber vitamin waters she’d taking a liking to from her time as Kelly using only one hand. “What’s up?” she asks taking a drink then setting the bottle back onto the table.

Regina lets out a slow breath going back to lazily batting her empty glass between her hands like a cat with a ball of yarn. “I forgot how hard this was.” She mumbles gloomily “The lying, the hiding.” She sighs again bringing the glass up in an attempt to catch any small leftover drops of the amber liquid that may still be left.

“I know what you mean.” Zelena nodes her hand once again closing in sympathy around her younger sister’s arm. “I have to catch myself so many times and even when she said she was alright with it I can tell Robin is really hurt that I’m keeping something from her.”

With another heavy sigh, Regina pulls herself to her feet and over to the side cabinet of the kitchen the backroom offered pulling out the whiskey bottle she’d stashed away after filling her glass to remove the temptation to simply drink the whole thing to avoid the pain in her chest. “What choice do we have Zelena?” she asks her voice sounding more pained with each passing second, “The more of us that are awake the more of a chance the curse will break meaning Henry will be killed.”

“I know I know.” Zelena defends taking another long drink of her suddenly bitter-tasting water. “I just hate lying to her. Especially now that she seems to have caught a new crush on some girl, she won’t let me meet.” It rips her up inside having to watch her daughter gush over some new mystery girl while Alice is still out there somewhere just as cursed and as turned around as Robin is.

She hadn’t been blind in their old life she knew dame well how Robin and Alice felt about one another.

Without having to ask Regina pulls out a second glass pouring more than a splash of amber into it before carrying both it and the whiskey bottle back to the table. “Sound like she’s reverted back to her high school years on you sis.”

“Thanks, sis.” Zelena hums with a sad smile while Regina refills her own glass and holds it up to clink against Kelly’s regardless of the fact the tumbler was already completely drained by then.

It’s the soft tinkling of the bell over the front door to the bar that puts a pause on the sisterly heart to heart.

“I thought you said you locked up after the last call.” Regina scolded already out of her chair and creeping toward the door to the backroom.

“I did.” her older sister promises only two steps behind.

The intruder was still by the door back to them when they reached the front of the bar. Head down as whoever it was shakes out their hair of the access water. Neither sister had noticed that it had started to rain until just then.

Going by the build Regina was going to guess the latecomer was female.

“Oh my Oz.” Zelena gasps from her shoulder.

“What?” Regina asks genuinely curious now as she looks between the two while her sister blinks a few more times looking even harder at the younger girl still with her back to them although Regina did have to admit this girl did have a nice mess of soft if not a little damp head of honey-colored curls. “Regina that’s Al--”

“Tilly.”

Margot’s excited greeting as she hurried passed them was all the conformation Regina need as she watches the pair engulf one another in a fierce greeting hug. Almost as if they where young lovers that had been separated for years instead of a single afternoon.

This girl was the reason for her nieces ‘case of young love’ her sister was teasing at back in the Enchanted Forest. The one that despite her best efforts she would just miss in her visits both to her sister’s farmhouse and to Nook’s camp. She remembers her own growing frustration over how close this young woman was becoming not only with her niece but her son and granddaughter while all she had to go on was secondhand tales. Nook, Zelena, Henry, Ella, Lucy, heck even the Imp _and_ Drizella had gotten to tangle with her before Regina had.

Finally, being able to properly put a face to the name did let the former villainess breath a little easier. Now she was able to judge for herself how right the young couple was together.

“So, I take it you missed me a little huh, Targo?” Tilly smiles when the couple finally decide to separate. The thinly laced cheekiness of the question had Regina raising an eyebrow in surprise whilst Zelena seemed to take it in stride if only with a light half-smile when she noticed just how flushed her daughter had become under the soft gaze of those striking blue eyes.

“Maybe.” Margot allowed using the small window which Tilly looks away to help her properly finish pulling on her jacket to get herself back under something resembling control rather than continue to be an uncool rambling mess like she currently felt like. “We’ll be back later.” she promises flipping her hair out of the collar of her jacket.

“And where may I ask are you two off to in this nightmare of a downpour?” Zelena smiles her hand rested against her chin as she props her elbow against the bar top.

“Seriously Mom?” Margot groans her arm once again finding a resting place around Tilly’s waist. A move by the way that the watching former villainesses note Alice wasn’t the least bit embarrassed about as she leans into Robin’s side.

“I promise I won’t have her out late if that’s what you’re wondering.” The still cursed realm jumper says meeting the mother’s eyes with a shy smile as she unconsciously nuzzling closer against Robin’s side as she spoke.

Regina hides a laugh behind her glass earning an annoyed glare from her niece as her arm once again draped around the other woman’s waist mostly to calm her own nerves while Zelena simply returns Alice’s friendly smile with one of her own. “I trust you.” She says honestly her eyes flickering between the two, so they understood she was speaking to both while only answering one. “But I’d still like to know….” She started to say noticing just how quickly the weather was changing on the other side of the bar’s front window something her hunter daughter hadn’t caught onto just yet.

“We’re going to see _‘Wicked’_ alright?” Margot blurts out the fingers of her free hand absently fiddling with the zipper on the front of her jacket. “One of the theater groups downtown is putting on an abridged performance tonight and Tilly and I are going to see it.”

It takes some shifting in the cursed created memories of Roni and Kelly for Regina and Zelena to understand the significance of the title.

“But there is also a movie theater down the block from my friend Roger’s place that is showing a rerelease of the cartooned version of _‘Snow White’_ so if the tickets for _‘Wicked’_ are already sold out by the time we get there we can still catch that.” The blue-eyed blonde says taring her eyes away from Margot’s mesmerizing green ones in order to remember it wasn’t just the two of them in the bar at the moment. “the _‘Wicked_ ’ showing is first come first ticketed.” She shrugged when she notices Regina’s raised eyebrow with her sister.

“Either that or _‘Tangled’_ but we could always make it a double feature kind of night if we don’t make _‘Wicked’._ ” Margot offers her gaze only on Tilly now as she spoke. “Either way we get popcorn.”

“As long as spending time with you is involved, I’d be alright with that alternate.” Tilly nodes with an amused grin. “but I really hope we can still catch the ‘ _Wicked’_ showing.” Tilly pouts looking back at the girl whose hand was still warmly entangled with her own. “from what you’ve told me about it I’ve really been looking forward to it.”

Margot laughed at that bringing the hand she was still holding up to press her lips reassuringly against the other girl’s knuckles “Just promise we you won’t read the book after we see the play.”

That was enough to catch not only Tilly’s attention but also Regina and Zelena’s as well. “There’s a book?” the three of them asked at the same time. Zelena even going a little pale at the very idea of such a thing regardless of how far off the mark that incarnation of her story was from her actual backstory.

Margot nods her head once, “That thing gave me nightmares.” she shudders.

“Really?” Tilly asks with a sympathetic look in those hypnotizing blue eyes of hers as her arms wind in comfort around the slightly taller girl’s middle.

Margot nodes again as she guides her date over to one of the side tables in front of the front window. The rain had really started picking up outside and no way was she risking Tilly’s health asking her to go out into it any time soon. “I vaguely remember picking it up from a bookshop you know just for something else to read during one of those bus breakdowns I told you about.” Margot details letting go of Tilly’s hand in order to pull out the chair on one side while adorably Tilly just did the same for her on the other side.

“Uhh--”

“haha Umm--”

Behind the bar, mother and aunt were having a hard time containing their laughter. “This is too cute.” Zelena whispered mostly watching her daughter’s bashful smile deepen while Alice lets out a few nervous giggles her teeth finding her lower lip the longer neither seemed willing to be the first to move.

“Bet you five Robin breaks first.” Regina whispers noticing just how fidgety her niece her become while Zelena shakes her head “Alice for sure.” She corrects swirling the last of the whiskey around the bottom of her glass while the pair continues to trade nervous glances. “Ten then.” Regina scoffs into the rim of her own tumbler.

“Alright then.” Zelena shrugs holding out her hand “Ten it is then, _and_ I get another one of your killer apple martinis.” She wagers.

Regina rolls her eyes as they shake “If you wanted a drink all you had to do was….” She started to say with a rough laugh only to be interrupted by a giggled comment from the table over by the front window.

“Thanks, Targo.” the blue-eyed blonde smiles as she rounds the table to take a seat in the chair Margot was still holding onto the back of for dear life. “You’re welcome, my lady.” Robin answers with a playful wink and a flash of a not so innocent smile that has the pair at the bar trading knowing glances while Tilly’s heart rate jumped three speeds in tempo.

“Can I offer either of you ladies a drink while I’m over here?” Regina calls out as she stalks behind the bar while her older sister gives her that smug grin of hers when she catches Regina’s eye.

“I’ll take a hit of something.” Robin agrees a bit too quickly for her mother’s liking, but Regina seems to roll with it asking a casual “any brand in mind, peanut?” as she pulls an empty tumbler out from under the bar.

“Something strong.” Margot shrugs finishing in tossing her jacket over the back of her chair.

“Could you make that two please?” Tilly adds mirroring the move after stashing her backpack at her feet.

Immediately Regina’s hand moves toward the whiskey selection as she faced the back wall behind the bar. “Coming right up ladies.” She promises picking out just the bottle for such a special occasion as this one was turning out to be.

“How about something to snack on to go with it?”

Again, Margot blinks in surprise at the offer while Tilly grins at the kindness of the two older women. “Why are you two being so nice? Last time I tried to bring a date here you two flipped out on me.” Her date questions nodding in thanks when Roni dropped off the twin tumblers of amber-colored liquid.

“Ohh. Brought a lot of girls, here before have you, Targo?” Tilly pounces with a teasing smile while her eyes flash in challenge as she brings her drink up to her lips.

“Not since I left on that backpacking trip.” Margot promises taking a measured sip from her own glass to steady her nerves. She still couldn’t put her finger on why every time she caught so much as a glimpse of the woman leaning in toward her across the table from her, her heart threatened to beat right out of her chest. It should scare her just how quickly she feels herself falling in love with this girl, but for the life of her, Margot can’t find it on her to care.


	2. Chapter 2

“So much for date night.” Margot sighed looking gloomily out at the yet to stop rainstorm raging on the other side of the glass.

“Come on Targo this might not have turned out as we planned but at least we’re together. That has to count for something.” Tilly counters as she steps up behind the sulking bartender standing in at the front window her arms sliding in low around Margot’s waist as her chin hooked over her girlfriend’s shoulder. In some ways, it just seems natural as if her body were acting independently of her mind as she loses herself in the rhythmic drum of the rain for a few seconds. Although some small voice in the back of her head is pointing out it normally it more her on the reserving end of this embrace rather than the giver of it.

At first, Margot seems to stiffen in her embrace and for a few terrifying seconds, Tilly wonders if her dazed mind had once again managed to ruin another of their dates until the slightly taller woman in her arms relaxes against her with a whispered “Next time I’m the protector.” against her throat when Margot let her head tip back to pillow against Tilly’s shoulder.

“Whatever you say Nobin.” Tilly hears herself laugh as she hides her face in Margot’s hair as her love snuggles back against her front as if they’d been a couple for a lot longer than a few weeks.

“Oh, so I’m Nobin now huh?” Margot chuckles after a few long seconds of rain watching as the green-eyed blond pivots around in the circle of Tilly’s arms.

Zelena’s ear pricks up at the nickname that even whispered seemed to carry over to them in the quiet bar while Regina’s brows pull together for a few puzzled seconds. “Wasn’t that what Robin’s….” she started to ask as her sister nodes “You don’t think?” the former Wicked Witch began to ask only to be quietly shushed by her sister.

“Got to say Tils I kind of like Targo better.” The green-eyed girl confesses sliding her hands into Tilly’s drying locks to push them back behind her ear as she leans in pressing her forehead to her girlfriend’s.

“Hey since you’re going to be here till this clears up mind helping me test out a new drink?” Regina wonders hiding a grin when both women start at her question.

She remembered those days with her Robin. Tuning out the world while just soaking in the warmth of his arms around her. A good thing now considering all she had left where her memories of him.

“Sure thing.” Margot nodes after a shy glance toward Tilly who nodded in quiet agreement as the pair stepped back toward their table.

“Great.” Regina smiles dropping off the twin shots of emerald green whiskey.

Margot giggles while she like Regina and Zelena watch as Tilly lifts her glass her brow cocked curiously as she examines the shot. “Humm smells like cinnamon.” She muses bringing the shot glass to her nose as if checking it wasn’t poisoned. “and apples.” She adds after another curious sniff.

“I have an idea.” Margot says so suddenly Tilly nearly chokes on her first tentative sip of her drink.

“Oh yeah?” Tilly coughs leaning in across the table while her free hand twirls the half-filled glass between her fingers.

Zelena nudges her sister’s arm somehow managing to keep up the charade of filling out the books while she inclines her head toward her rather animated daughter now whispering something in her date’s ear.

“I haven’t seen her that excited about anything since she had that sword sparing session with Nook that ended with Alice kissing her for the first time in front of the whole camp.” Her sister narrates in a low murmur as her hand makes a rather believable side down a page of numbers yet Zelena’s eyes hadn’t moved from her not so covert watching of her daughter’s date playing out across the room.

Regina glances up just in time to feel her heart both sour and shatters all at the same time at the current look on her niece’s face. “Sometimes I forget just how like her father that girl is.” She chokes out remembering a happier time when her own Robin had flashed an identical beaming smile just like the one his daughter was sporting as Alice nodes in eager agreement to whatever it was Robin was proposing.

“I’ll be right back.” Margot promises not a half a beat later. Its only Tilly’s hand closing around the back that keeps Margot’s chair from toppling over altogether “I’ll be timing you.” The pirate’s daughter warns with a playful wink in her date’s direction.

“Hey, just so I’m sure. The sound system for the stage still works right?” an eager looking Robin questions in one long breath only after she’d skidded to a stop from slamming into her aunt’s side.

“Yeah, we just used it last Tuesday for karaoke night.” Regina answers in a stammer bringing another of Robin’s beaming smiles as she calls a quick. “You’re good to go Tils.” Over her shoulder before taking off toward the back room and storming loudly up the back steps to the overhead apartment the three shared.

Before either Regina or her sister could think of a good enough question to ask other than _‘what are you girls up too?’_ as they watch Alice’s most streetwise persona messing around with the bar’s sound system Robin was back with an announcing “Sorry Mom but I needed to borrow a few things from your closet.” As she comes back down into the bar. “Yours too Roni.” She adds dumping her selections onto one of the tables by the small raised stage in the back corner.

“Wow. Love the new look, West.” Tilly praises looking her girlfriend up and down.

“What this?” Margot lets out a nervous little laugh as she smooths her hand down the front of her newly thrown together outfit. Dark washed pants she’d hastily paired with a hunter green colored soft fabric front lace-up shirt that looked more at home in one of those more Hollywood ‘Robin Hood’ movies than hanging in Margot’s closet.

Tilly nodes licking her lips as her eyes find Margot’s “Green really is your color love.”

Apparently Zelena’s shocked gasp after looking up to catch sight of her daughter again wasn’t as in her head as she’d thought while her hand tightened even more on the sleeve of her sister’s shirt as the young couple spring apart because of the sound as if just then remembering it wasn’t just the two of them in the rained out bar.

Regina’s grip was equally as unyielding once she’d spotted the gloves Margot had pulled on once she’d tossed a rather bulky green something toward Tilly with a telling wink that had the blue-eyed blonde blushing a deep shade of pink.

The green leather ones that once upon a time were covering her sister’s hands as the pair did witchy battle down main street in full view of nearly everyone in Storybrooke.

“What? Is it sitting crooked or something??” Margot wonders following her mother’s gaze rather than her aunts as she hurries over to check her reflection in the rain splattered front window while her now green incased fingers tug on the slanted black hat now sitting on top of her head.

“Sweetheart where did you find those?” Zelena questions her tone more than a little shaky when faced with some of the more glaring reminders of her much more villainous past.

“I told you I needed to borrow a few things.” Margot reminds still fussing over the look of the borrowed hat. “Also, I’m going to need both your help to pull this off.”

The sisters share a puzzled glance while Tilly holds up one of the other things her girlfriend had brought down with her. “Where did you get this?”

“New York. I picked him up the first time I ever saw the show.” Margot shrugged sparing the item in question a glance “A few friends of mine dragged me along cause they had three tickets but the third person decided not to go and I don’t know I was bored just standing in line so I swiped two of them while the woman running the souvenirs table rang up the guy ahead of me, but I ended up giving the other one to a little girl sitting along our row when she got scared of the Wizards giant talking head chair thingy.” She explained at Tilly’s probing grin as she cradles the small beanie toy that had been there for every rainstorm and bus breakdown Margot had been thought since. “Not that I blame her. That thing was creepy.”

“You stole a flying monkey?” Tilly asked impressed while her mother’s eyes shine with unshed tears.

“Maybe.” Margot toys with a grin “I call him Roland.”

Again, the sisters shared a look both trying to keep straight faces at the sound of the name.

“So, what is this grand idea of yours monkey?” Zelena prompts taking a seat at the bar beside her sister.

“Oh, that.” Margot remembers “Well I just thought that since Tils and I can’t go see ‘Wicked’ thanks to the rain---and you know since I’ve seen it like a zillion times --" she started to explain her head dropping to stair rather intently at her shoes. “We’d put on our own show.”

“With only the four of us?” Reinga wonders.

Margot nodes “I mean we’d play the soundtrack for the songs and for story progression, I’d fill in where needed plot and story-wise, and yeah I know we have to you know improvise a few characters here and there, but I figured I’d primarily be Elphaba and Tilly would play Fiyero, Mom you’d be our Glinda.” Regina swears she’d at least bruised a rib or two laughing so hard at the casting choice while here former green-skinned sister tries to incinerate her by a glare alone “And Aunt Roni would be Nessa.” The world traveler finishes meeting Tilly’s confused look with one of her own at the reaction.

“Sounds like fun darling.” Zelena agrees helping her still chuckling sister up from the floor.

“Really?” Margot asks hopefully.

“Absolutely.” Zelena nodes as she does one last finishing fix of the very hat that had once struck so much fear into all of Oz now resting on her daughter’s head. Regina for her part helps Tilly roll up the too-long sleeves on the ‘fake’ Oz uniform jacket the blonde was now wearing. The very one she’d once heard her outlaw of a true love wore when facing down her sister back in their world.

“Thanks, Mom.” Margot beams throwing her arms around her mother in a tight hug.

“This is going to be absolutely _Wicked_.” Tilly claps excitedly while Regina hits play on her niece’s phone starting up the first track of the already cued up playlist.


End file.
